Web winders and web winding methods are known in various embodiment forms and are e.g. described in DE-A 2 243 504, EP-A-0 017 277, EP-A-0 394 197 and CH-A-683 992 and the state of the art is described in these documents. Common to the known winders is that a relatively quick running and more or less endless material web of plastic foil, paper textile material or another relatively thin (typically 10 to 1000 .mu.m thick) and flexible material with working widths of up to a few meters either in the course of the manufacture of the web material or with its processing must be continuously wound, i.e. without interruption of the flow of material, onto a series of core mandrels which are fed to the winder from a winding reel magazine.
With this there are in particular two problems to be solved, specifically on the one hand a very rapid, clean and precise separation or cutting procedure is to be effected and on the other hand the front end of a new web section is to be brought into winding contact with a fresh, i.e. empty core mandrel. An approximately right-angled cutting procedure with high web running speeds may only be achieved with a knife acting suddenly, e.g. within 0.1-0.5 seconds, over the whole web width, which with web winders for the production or processing of typical technical plastic foils is mostly a serrated knife, as is described in CH-A-674 352. According to the transverse cutting method described in the above mentioned patent document DE-A-2 243 504 a knife or blade with a relatively high speed is guided transversely over the material web, which leads to an oblique cut.
For achieving the winding contact for the winding of a core mandrel which is still empty usually adhesives or adhesive tapes are used. This in practice has various disadvantages such as the lessening of the effectiveness of the adhesive layers by dust, the unwanted contamination of adhesive or adhesive tape into the winding and the use of organic solvents. Suggestions for achieving the winding contact by way of electrostatics, such as e.g. in EP-A- 0 270 498 and the state of the art described therein have not been able to be sustained in practice up to now on account of the required high voltages and the consequences of a change in air humidity.
A common disadvantage of the known methods and devices is a more or less heavy jerk with the winding procedure which may lead to disadvantageous effects on premounted, i.e. on the upstream side manufacturing, processing or refining units.